Perhaps the most remarkable industrialist since Henry Ford. Originally part-owner of a photography concern, he was employed by a gravel/cement firm when he opportunistically took over a bankrupt road construction company in 1914. He made the firm profitable and built it into a thriving enterprise constructing roads, dams, bridges, etc. In World War II he created an unprecedented assembly line whereby ships could be constructed in less than five days. At the Richmond Kaiser Shipyards he founded Kaiser Permanente Health Care, the first prototype of the modern HMO. In later years he developed land in Hawaii.